Interviews

EANpages: How do you see the role of the Scientific Committee within the overall work of the EAN? Antonio Federico (AF): The Scientific Committee (SC) is one of the most important EAN committees since its role is to coordinate the activities of the 31 Scientific Panels (SP) and has thus a close relationship with the EAN members. Its role is the promotion of scientific activities and of collaborations within the different European countries.

How do you see the role of the Communication Committee (CC) within the overall work of the EAN? In principle, communication is at the basis of the functioning of a society, both within, and with partners or the various publics. The main communicators of a society are its president, the members of the board and, the executive director. The CC is more a think tank, an initiator, a follow-upper, and a workhorse tackling all the various communication agenda.

How do you see the role of the Education Committee within the overall work of EAN? Prof. Hannah Cock (HC): Education is fundamental to the vision of EAN. Education underpins the sharing of knowledge and excellence. It also forms a substantial part of the annual congress, and offers numerous other opportunities to bring members together including our regular schools and other teaching courses and e-learning resources.

Prof Gunhild Waldemar (GW): Prof. Winblad, from EADC’s point of view, how is the research into dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease in particular, highlighted or addressed in the Swedish national dementia strategy launched so recently? Will it positively influence the ongoing research? Prof. Bengt Winblad (BW): Sweden launched a ”National Dementia Strategy” May 24, 2018. A general disappointment was that one of the countries leading much of research in care, epidemiology, clinical and basic research did not even produce a Dementia Plan like the other Scandinavian countries and most other EU countries.

Prof. David B. Vodušek (DBV): Kindly illustrate the history, vision and mission of the EANM – European Association of  Nuclear Medicine to the readers of the EAN Pages. Prof. K. Muylle (KM): The European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM) is a professional non-profit medical association, incorporated in Vienna/Austria. The EANM’s vision is to optimise and advance science and education in nuclear medicine for the benefit of public health and humanity within the concept of personalised healthcare. The EANM acts as umbrella organisation for individuals as well as national societies.

Prof. Elena Moro (EM): Dear Prof. Hallett, it is a great honor for me, as movement disorders specialist, to ask you few questions on behalf of the EAN members and for all EAN pages readers. In light of your Honorary Membership to the EAN, can you tell us what did make you choose “neurology” as the specialty to pursue? Prof. Mark Hallett (MH): I have been interested in the brain since I took a psychology course in high school.  I pursued neuroscience studies in college, but only decided to go into medicine about half way through college. 

David B. Vodušek (DBV): Mr Bundgaard-Nielsen, you have been director of the Lundbeck Foundation. Can you explain to our readers the facts about this foundation and its relations to Lundbeck, the well known pharmaceutical company? Mogens Bundgaard-Nielsen (MBN): The Lundbeck Foundation was established in 1954 by Grete Lundbeck. She was the widow after Hans Lundbeck, the founder of the company H. Lundbeck who died some 10 years earlier. She eventually

Prof. Elena Moro (EM): Dear Prof Correia, could you briefly summarize for the EANpages readers the history of the Portuguese National Neurological Society, and its major achievements at national level? Prof. Manuel Correia (MC): The first neuroscientific society in Portugal was founded in 1948, and it was named the “Sociedade Portuguesa de Oto-Neuro-Oftalmologia. The first century of Ophtalmoscopy was celebrated in Lisbon on the 26th of April 1952.

Prof. David B. Vodušek (DVB): Dear Prof. Zuberi I congratulate you with your new position as President of the EPNS. EAN addresses clinical neurology and needs to broaden its spectrum also towards clinical neuro-pediatrics. Kindly introduce the EPNS and its work to the readers of the EAN Pages Prof. Sameer Zuberi (SZ): Thank you. It is a special honour and a privilege for me to be elected as President of the EPNS. Our outgoing President, Lieven Lagae, deserves an enormous thank you from all of us— for guiding the society so ably.

Prof. Wolfgang Oertel (WO): Dear Prof. Di Luca I congratulate you with your new position and kindly ask you to illustrate your plans for EBC’s strategy and work in the years to come. Prof. Monica Di Luca (MDL): Being elected as President of EBC is a great honour for me as well as an important challenge. This is an important era for EBC. Thanks to the excellent work of the past President David Nutt, the last 4 years witnessed the consolidation of our Council in the European scenario as the ideal platform where all voices related to brain research could find an interlocutor and could merge. We are now in the privileged position to start new projects and bring EBC to a next step.

Gunhild Waldemar (GW): Can you please tell the EAN Pages readers about the goals of the BioMed Alliance and the criteria that need to be fulfilled in order to become a member of the BioMed Alliance? Axel Pries (AP): The Association’s principal goals and objectives are to promote the best interests and values of researchers, of healthcare professionals, and of non-for-profit medical associations and organisations across all medical disciplines in Europe, in those general areas of common interest.

Eveline Sipido: Thank you for hosting applicants of the EAN Clinical Fellowship. How would you evaluate this EAN educational opportunity? Mark Edwards (ME)/Anthony Pereira (AP): St George’s runs one of the largest Neurology & Stroke training schemes in the UK.  We cover the UK curriculum on site and so can provide a comprehensive clinical training in neurology and stroke medicine.

Antonio Federico (AF): Dear Professor, you founded Orphanet and gave a great contribution on the development of information about Rare Diseases in Europe. Can you summarize your past activities and the difficulties you had? Segolene Aymé (SA): That is a long story as I started to build a database of genetic diseases and of malformation syndromes described in the literature, in the mid-seventies, when I started as a clinician in medical genetics, lost in diagnosing most of the patients attending our clinic in Marseilles.

Elena Moro: Dear Prof. Vincent, you have recently been awarded with the WFN Medal for Scientific Achievement in Neurology. We congratulate with you for this well-deserved outstanding recognition! In light of your longstanding experience in the world of neuro-immunology in particular, what do you think is it the most recent important discovery in your field? Angela Vincent (AV): Well first of all thank you for the congratulations.  I am thrilled to receive the WFN Medal and it is much appreciated. Neuroimmunology is a relatively recent discipline – probably only first defined in the 1980s. 

As in the previous years, EANpages asked EAN committee members, panel chairs, and invited speakers  which session one should not miss at the upcoming congress in Lisbon 2018. Please find their answers below!